Antidepressants are no more effective than placebo as a treatment for patients with subthreshold depression, a meta-analysis has found. Six double-blind randomised controlled trials met the inclusion criteria. There was a total of 468 participants (234 treated with antidepressants and 234 with placebo). Three studies compared paroxetine with placebo, and fluoxetine, amitriptyline and isocarboxacid were each compared with placebo in individual studies. 'Both NICE and the British Association for Psychopharmacology do not recommend the use of antidepressants for short-duration (